BY REGINALD HODDER HODDER AND STOUGHTON LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO MCMXIV The Author wishes to express his indebtedness to Mr. J. Norvill for his valuable assistance and suggestions....

"The Rusty Buckles." The 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queen's Bays) got their name of "The Bays" in 1767 when they were mounted on bay horses—a thing which distinguished them from other regiments, which, with the exception of the Scots Greys, had black horses. Their nickname, "The Rusty Buckles," though lending itself to a ready explanation, is doubtful as to its origin; but one thing is certain that the rust remained on the buckles only because the fighting was so strenuous and prolonged that there was

The 5th Dragoon Guards were raised by the Earl of Shrewsbury to support James against "King Monmouth" at Sedgmoor. For the same reasons that "Britons never, never will be slaves," they refused, on consideration, to support James, and sided with William, for whom they threw in their weight at the Boyne. They were also at a former siege of Namur, and bore themselves bravely at Blenheim. The story is told that, after that battle, a Sunday Church parade was called, in which the British army deployed

There is not a woman in our vast Empire who has not good cause to regard with admiration and gratitude those noble protectors and terrible avengers of the honour of their sex—the Carabiniers. During the Indian Mutiny—but first a brief word as to their history. It dates from the time of Monmouth's rebellion, when they were raised by Lord Lumley to support King James. Owing to the fact, however, that Lord Lumley was no supporter of the king's tyrannies, the regiment seceded, and later, when the Pr

"Greys, gallant Greys! I am 61 years old, but, if I were young again, I should like to be one of you."— Sir Colin Campbell at Balaclava. The 2nd Dragoons (Royal Scots Greys), whose motto is "Second to None," are pictured to British eyes and imaginations in that wonderful painting, "Scotland for Ever." The Charge of the Light Brigade, great and glorious as it was, is, and ever will be, is perpetually linked with the Charge of the Heavy Brigade, under Scarlett, when, faced with a vastly superior f

"Merebimur."— Their Motto. One of the most thrilling and romantic episodes in cavalry fighting is the historic achievement of the 15th Hussars at Emsdorf. It was in July, 1760, that Major Erskine halted his troopers near the German village of Emsdorf, and bade them pluck the fresh twigs from the overhanging oaks, with a word of exhortation to the effect that they would acquit themselves with the firmness and stubbornness which have always been ascribed to that symbolic tree. Not long after this,

The generic name of the 18th Hussars (Drogheda Light Horse) was bestowed specifically upon the corps raised in Ireland in 1759 by the Marquis of Drogheda, and numbered as the 19th Light Dragoons. It was renumbered as the 18th Light Dragoons in 1763, became a Hussar corps in 1807, and was disbanded as the 18th Light Dragoons in 1821. The present 18th Hussars were raised at Leeds in 1858, and inherited the honours of the Drogheda Light Horse proper. The silver trumpets used by the Drogheda Light H

High in the estimation of every son and daughter of Britain stands that heroic band, the British Grenadiers. Their deeds have brought a fine thrill to every heart, and a stirring song to every voice; and, though there have been times when a pall of necessary silence, covering a "certain liveliness," has been imposed by the fog of a world-war, we have felt calmly assured that behind that fog our British Grenadiers were doing, or dying, in a way that must awaken the old thrill, and inspire a new s

"Sire! this regiment refuses to be known as second to any in the British Army."— Monk ( to Charles II. ) History tells again how, in 1661, Charles, distrusting the soldiers in his service, called the 1st Foot Guards back to England. Following upon this, he speedily dismissed his Commonwealth soldiers, and, of all the Puritan regiments, he retained but one—the Coldstream Guards. This was the regiment which Monk had marched from Coldstream to the King's aid; hence their retention. An interesting s

"A volley, my lads, and then the steel!"— Their Captain at Wepener. The Royal Scots (1st Foot, or Lothian Regiment) are old in story. Several hundreds of years before the battle of Blenheim, which is among the first of their honours, the Royal Scots had traced their earlier glories on the roll of fame. Few European battlefields could disclaim acquaintance with them, and there are few on which they have not been responsible for terrific slaughter, and a large share in the crux of victory. Their a

The "Fighting Fifth" (Northumberland Fusiliers) have a peculiar paradox in their history. They were first raised in 1674 by Prince William of Orange, the Dutchman, and, in the last Boer War, they were fighting against the Dutch themselves. But even stranger things than that have come to pass in these later days when we have good cause to call our old allies our enemies, and our old enemies our allies. The "Fighting Fifth" derived their regimental name, the Northumberland Fusiliers, from Hugh, Ea

The Liverpool Regiment, like the 5th Dragoon Guards, was raised to help James, and, like them, it sided with the right against him. When James tried to place Roman Catholic officers over English regiments, with the help of the Liverpool Regiment, the colonel and five officers strongly objected. James sent his son, Fitzjames, Duke of Berwick, to Portsmouth, to correct them; but on this, and the issue of it, the country rose, saying unanimously that James was wrong, and the "six Portsmouth captain

"Our country will, I believe, sooner forgive an officer for attacking his enemy, than for omitting to do it…. "A Norfolk man is as good as two others."— Nelson. Of the Norfolk Regiment, then known as the 9th (East Norfolk) Regiment, Napier said, with a happy mixture of blame and praise: "They were guilty of a fierce neglect of orders in taking a path leading immediately to the enemy." Indeed, that is exactly what they did at the battle of Roliça on the 17th August, 1808. Their intrepidity and fi

"We are but few, but of the right sort."— Nelson. "Highlanders, remember Egypt!"— Sir John Moore at Corunna. These men need a book to themselves. It is impossible here to give more than a short account of one or two of their most brilliant fights, but, as from the peck you may judge of the barrel, so one will find the invincible temper of the Black Watch in every line and every word. It was at Fontenoy that the Black Watch first met a foreign foe, and their dealings with that foe were an emphati

"Shew me a well authenticated instance of the troops of any other nation gaining and holding an 'impossible' position against fearful odds, and I will shew you a wavering in, or, at least, a qualification of, our national faith that our allied British infantry is the best in the world."— French Daily Newspaper, August, 1914. It was at Elandslaagte that the 1st Battalion of this gallant regiment, together with the Gordon Highlanders and the Light Horse, distinguished themselves in a terrible pass

"You have saved the day, Highlanders, but you must return to your position. There is more work to be done."— Sir Denis Pack at Waterloo. Sir Denis Pack's words at Waterloo are as true to-day as they were then. The Gordons have always saved the day, and now they must return to their position. There is more work to be done and the Gordons are there to do it, as before. The following is an extract from a letter to Sir Walter Scott from Viscount Vanderfosse, first Advocate of the Superior Court of J

"Rangers of Connaught, the eyes of all Ireland are on you this day. On then, and at them, and if you do not give them the soundest thrashing they have ever got in their lives, you needn't look me in the face again in this world or the next."— Colonel-in-Command at the Front. Towards the close of the Transvaal War the 2nd Battalion of the Connaught Rangers performed a heroic feat, which tended to mitigate the peace-with-little-honour feeling which marked the peace negotiations of 1879. Lydenberg

"Wherever they have lived and fought they have carried with them the fearless picturesqueness of their indomitable mountains." At Sevastopol, as at few other battles in the history of wars, was displayed the most magnificent valour of the Highlander. The approaches to Balaclava were protected by six batteries manned by Turks, who, it will be remembered, were in those days our allies. On October 25th, 1854, the Russians made a determined attack on these redoubts, speedily captured three of the ba

The Dublin Fusiliers had a large share in writing the red history of India. Their prestige has been drawn mainly from the East. Indeed, although they have been in existence 246 years, they never set eyes on the white cliffs of Dover until the other day, so to speak, in 1871. On their colours stand the Royal Tiger of Bengal, and the Indian Elephant, together with the honours—Plassey, Mysore, The Carnatic, Buxar, and many others gained in India which are unknown to any other regiment. In the conqu

"A battle's never lost until it's won."— Old British proverb. "Nothing could stop that astonishing infantry." Napier. As at Balaclava and Inkerman, a great number of our Expeditionary regiments now contending side by side at the front were present at the victorious battle of Fuentes d'Onoro, and a new significance attaches to that name from the fact that these regiments were mainly responsible for the victory on that occasion. The battle is also very noteworthy in the annals of British pluck and

"The Cavalry do as they like to the enemy until they are confronted by thrice their numbers…. "Our Artillery has never been opposed to less than three or four times their numbers."— Sir John French at the Front. The majority of the Expeditionary Forces now at the front carry in their hearts if not on their standards the glorious legends of Balaclava and of Inkerman. At a time when it has become so evident that the tendency of the Prussian military system is to crush individual initiative, while